


Defeat

by tansypool



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, post-purple wedding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-27
Updated: 2014-04-27
Packaged: 2018-01-21 00:09:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1530785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tansypool/pseuds/tansypool
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His sister had never looked more defeated.</p><p>Post Purple Wedding, specific to TV canon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Defeat

**Author's Note:**

> This sticks to the canon presented by the show, but let's pretend that that scene in 4x03 played out exactly as it did in the book.

His sister had never looked more defeated.

As children, they would play at each other’s lives for a few hours, and Cersei would always be sullen upon returning to her dresses and needlework, while Jaime returned to blunted swords and breeches. He had always found it interesting but was never in a hurry to switch again. Cersei was never in a hurry to return to her own life.

They had been born in a way that could have deemed them equals, but when they were old enough to be told apart as more than just children of the same age with golden hair, the divide grew, and with it, Cersei’s hatred for the way that she was forced to live. Few things could set them farther apart than this, though.

She’d cried herself empty of tears hours ago, worn her voice hoarse by screams and accusations, and even her dry sobs had grown softer. Servants had come by with food that she had refused, even at the plying of their father for her to eat. At the suggestion of wine, her eyes had widened and she had forced it away so quickly that it had almost spilled.

Jaime had not seen his sister since then - she’d hurried out of the room, head high and lips set as she held herself as composed as she could, though she did not meet anybody’s eyes. He found himself fearing for her by the time he found her sitting alone. The sun had set enough that the room in which she sat was lit by naught but the light of a handful of candles, flickering weakly.

He had seen his sister broken, battered, wanting nothing more than to end the life that she had been forced to live. But had seen her happy, too - holding their children after their births, wearing his breeches and living as him for fleeting moments in childhood, digging her nails into his back as she moaned into his neck. He had never seen her look so defeated, so void of any emotion beyond sheer exhaustion.

She didn’t look up as he walked in, or even react to the door quietly coming to rest against its frame. “Cersei,” Jaime whispered, hoping to get her attention.

She glanced up, but made no move to shift from the seat in which she sat. “He’s gone.” Her voice was hoarse enough that Jaime had to strain to hear. “He’s dead. He’s gone. The maesters took him. He’s gone…” She trailed off, and her gaze fell to the same patch of ground that she had before seemingly been staring through.

Maybe, in another lifetime, Jaime would have been allowed to grieve for his dead son. Maybe, in another lifetime, he’d have had reason to; instead, all he saw fit to grieve was a mad king, and his grief was for his sister.

Was there anything that he could say? The damage was done. Joffrey was dead. Tommen would be king, and this needed to be arranged, a coronation ordered, but first, the realm had a king to mourn for and to honour.

So many duties were still to be borne by Cersei - she had so little opportunity to mourn privately that it would be unfair to not allow her this time. But she still could not take that time.

He stood a few feet from where she sat. “You need to rest,” he said, watching for a reaction. She eventually, slowly, looked up, but looking into her eyes, he couldn’t tell what was going on in her mind. Rather than trying to talk it out of her, he sat down, and felt her head come to rest on his shoulder.

He wrapped an arm around her back and pulled her closer, running his thumb over her ribs. When he pressed a light kiss to the top of her head, she did not react, and so he realised that she was slowly falling asleep, and was not fighting it.

_She will not want to be seen like this._

Keeping his left arm around her and his hand holding her close, he reached down to thread his right arm beneath her knees. She didn’t protest as he lifted her, and instead curled into his chest, eyes drifting shut and breaths slowing.

The door had not entirely closed, so Jaime was still able to nudge it open, awkward though that action was. The Red Keep was near silent, still reeling from the events of the day; nobody saw them, and so nobody knew that Cersei did not make her own way to her chambers.

She stirred as he forced the door open with his back - there had been no way to avoid jostling her. So when he set her on the bed, rather than sleeping as she had been, she stayed upright, watching him.

Eventually, she murmured, “Please stay.” But he knew that she would be watched and that so much would be expected of her from the first light of dawn tomorrow, and that she would regret even being carried to bed. There would be time to be together, yes, but that time was not now, not when she had been left so shattered by the day.

Instead, he kissed her lightly on the top of her head, and left her chambers without looking back.


End file.
